The Northern Sea Route: Possibilities of Navigation and Maritime Trade

The financial loss to the global trade rounded off to one billion USD [1]. The incident highlighted the vulnerabilities of the age-old artificial transport system. Further, countries began to move towards other prospective alternatives including the Northern Sea Route (NSR). 

Historical Account

The Northern Sea Route is one of the most elaborate Arctic maritime routes. The passage was first discovered during the Vega expedition in 1878 by Adolf Erik Nordenskiold [2]. Since the 1930s, it is officially managed by the Russian administration. Later in 2018, the due responsibility of the sea route was handed over to Rosatom, a state corporation that specializes in nuclear energy. Russia has undertaken continuous efforts to gather information on the operational feasibility and understand the commercial viability of the NSR. It is a known fact that the Arctic is not a favorable trade passage for conducting global trade due to the presence of vast swathes of ice. Therefore, the expenditure for traversing via this route becomes uneconomical for the countries.

The shipping route stretches from east of Novaya Zemlya running along the Russian Arctic coast covering the Kara Sea, the East Siberian Sea, and the Bering Sea. The entire route lies within the Arctic waters and Russia’s Exclusive Economic Zone. Reports suggest that the increased melting of the ice caps would make the NSR highly suitable for maritime trade and faster navigation. The route is expected to encounter huge maritime traffic in the near future. The major advantage of adopting NSR compared to the conventional Suez Canal is efficiency in commerce as users would save plenty on fuel with the reduction in distance. In short, the NSR is gradually turning into a commercially attractive option together with reduced carbon emissions. It is no longer an impassable sea route as in the previous decades.

Future Possibilities

Scientists have predicted that the Arctic sea lanes would become ice-free during the summer season by 2035 transforming the region to be extensively profitable. The NSR will reshape the global shipping possibilities. It saves up to 20 days of the total shipping time dedicated to traveling through the Suez Canal as claimed by China [3]. When the global supply is rushing at such a fast pace and decisions are made from one corner of the world to another in seconds, ship delays could cause economic damage in millions. The problem was at its peak during the period of the pandemic when countries realize the need for a swifter way to ship supplies around the world. Arctic shipping was the straightforward solution presented. Between the years 2013-2019, shipping activities in the Arctic have increased by 25 percent and more melting of Arctic ice is paving way for heightened human endeavors.

The Arctic shipping includes the Northwest Passage running along the North American coast connecting the Pacific Ocean and the Atlantic Ocean; and the Northern Sea Route which is less complex relatively. The two major users of the NSR are Russia and China. It was the first time in 2018 that Russia transported LNG cargo to China via the NSR [4]. Russia, a witness to the success of this export targets to utilize the NSR all year long which would boost natural gas supply to Asia from Eastern Russia and Siberia. Both Russia and China are progressing in building infrastructure alongside the NSR including a fleet of icebreakers which makes these Communist regimes far better prepared to reap benefits of the region than other countries. Recently, an Arc7 ice-class module carrier ‘Audax’ dispatched a large prefabricated plant module from Tianjin in China to Russia’s Novatek built Arctic LNG2 facility near Murmansk via the NSR. Further, Novatek aims to convert the possibility of year-round LNG deliveries through this route to the Asia-Pacific region a reality.

The stakes are higher for Russia because around 30 percent of its GDP depends on the Arctic maritime trade with a minimal contest from the West [5]. It is reported that among the total traffic of 150 million tonnes per year, Russia accounts for 110 million tonnes incorporating exports of LNG, crude oil, coal, and metal commodities. The shipping route is running at a limited capacity for now with Russian authorities in charge of collecting transit fees and providing ice-breakers to the users. However, the NSR is going to be an essential trade and navigation corridor in the future giving cut-throat competition to the popular Suez Canal. Moreover, Russia would be the critical decision-maker in the region as the Arctic's most trafficked shipping lane, the NSR, crosses through its territorial waters offering a huge leverage. President Putin back in 2018 also determined to increase the annual average cargo volume over this route to 80 million tonnes from the previous 30 by 2024 [6].

Potential Damages

It is recorded that about 1,207,000 square kilometers of Arctic ice have melted since 1999. Although melting of ice is the worst environmental scenario due to increasing global warming, it is perceived beneficial for the shipping odds in the Arctic. The continuous reduction in the ice fields would initiate numerous commercial projects. For shippers worldwide, the NSR as a viable transportation route would be extremely crucial for economic development. However, it will further impair the surroundings of the polar region. The communities residing along the coast as well as the fauna dependent on the sea ice and Arctic waters will be the worst sufferers. Shipping will have a major impact on fishing in the sea which is both a food source and economic opportunity for the human clusters in the Arctic. Increased volume of trade via the Arctic routes would cause predictable damages such as oil spillage and ship wreckage. Moreover, as the gates for these waters are now wide open, the extraction of natural resources including oil and gas will escalate. Therefore, climate change and vessel movement are tightly interlinked in this case which in turn will have a negative cumulative effect upon the Arctic waters with soaring sea and air pollution in the region. The popular expression explains that it is difficult to strike a fine balance between economic growth and ecology because ‘they are opposite sides of the same coin’.

Conclusion

Russia holds the chairmanship of the Arctic Council until 2023. This will enhance the opportunities via the NSR in the future convincing the other members and related organizations participating in the council to expand maritime operations in the Arctic waters. The Russian government is eager to explore more in the Arctic region as the sea routes here are potentially more convenient and freer from the undesirable bottlenecks experienced in either Panama or Suez Canal. Although one cannot neglect the limited infrastructure along the NSR in case of emergencies including medical support for the ship crews or the need for expensive specialized vessels. Additionally, Arctic transit is highly unpredictable and extremely brutal at times. To eliminate such uncertainties, the Nippon Foundation-GEBCO Seabed 2030 project aims to map the oceans around the world [6]. The Regional Center for the Arctic and North Pacific Ocean is one of the four seabed mapping centers functioning jointly by Stockholm University and the University of New Hampshire. Ocean floor mapping along with scientific studies on the Arctic environment would strengthen the possibilities of navigation and maritime trade.

References:

[1]https://www.business-standard.com/article/international/suez-canal-blockade-egypt-demands-550-mn-from-japanese-cargo-ship-owner-121053100369_1.html#:~:text=Egyptian%20authorities%20are%20demanding%20550,several%20days%2C%20NHK%20World%20reported.

[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Northern_Sea_Route

[3]https://www.cnbc.com/2022/02/16/arctic-summers-could-be-ice-free-by-2035-enabling-faster-shipping.html

[4] https://www.reuters.com/article/us-novatek-cnpc-lng-idUSKBN1K90YN

[5]https://www.economist.com/the-economist-explains/2018/09/24/what-is-the-northern-sea-route

[6]https://www.aa.com.tr/en/analysis/analysis-russia-seeks-to-create-alternative-to-suez-canal-via-northern-sea-route/2201874

[7]https://seabed2030.org/news/new-depth-map-over-arctic-ocean

Pic Courtesy-NASA

(The views expressed are those of the author and do not represent views of CESCUBE.)